Dumb-struck and stirless long the Sanhedrim—
Instinctively abhorrent from the part
Of that base councillor—at last there rose
A new assessor in the midst to speak.
A young man he, who, in the general thought,
Wherever moving, round about him wore
A golden halo of uncertain hope
And prophecy of bright futures. Aspect clear
And pure; straight stature; foothold firm and free;
The bloom of youth just ripening to the hue
Of perfect manhood upon cheek and brow;
Lip mobile, but not lax—capacity
Expressed of exquisite emotion, will
Elastic and resilient, tempered true
To bend, not break, and ultimately strong;
Glances of lightning latent in the eye,
But lightning liable to be quenched in tears;
The pride of every Hebrew, such was Saul.
A stir of expectation broke the hush
Of that strange silence, ere his opening words:
"That I, the youngest of this order, thus
Should rise for speech—and that beloved gray head
Before me bowed, unready yet—might seem
Unseemly. But to speak after he speaks,
My own reveréd guide, the guide of all,
Would be, should I then speak to differ, more
Unseemly still. And what I have to say,
Being my thought, burns in me to be said,
Approve, condemn, who will; God bids me speak."
Gamaliel raised his head and looked at Saul.
Saul felt the look, and hardened his will, but not
His heart, to meet it. Turning so, he saw,
Not what he inly braced himself to bear,
Warning, rebuke, anger to overawe,
Reproach, appeal, dissuasion, pain confessed
At filial separation, grasp of will
At old authority elapsed—of these,
Naught; only a pathos of perplexity,
A broken, anguished, groping childlikeness,
Desire of any help, and hope of none—
Saul will hereafter understand it all;
He simply marks it now compassionately
In wonder, pausing not, and thus, with loth
Allusion to the last advice, proceeds:
"But other speech my lips refuse, until
I purge my conscience by protesting here,
For me, I spurn, scorn, hate, loathe utterly
The devil and devilish lies. I have no qualms
At blood, but I love truth, and qualms I own
At falsehood, practised in whatever name;
Damnable ever, then thrice damnable,
Damning a holy cause it feigns to serve!"
A flush of warm revival in the breasts
Of some that listened answered to such words.
But one there was, that vile adviser, felt
A gripe of mortal hatred at his heart.
He, by Gamaliel's eye not unobserved,
Behind a black malignant scowl which, like
That murk emission of the cuttle-fish,
Flushed from his heart his face to overspread
And hide his thought, sat fostering the wound
Of Saul's disdainful noble words—a wound
To rankle long in the obscene recess
Of that bad bosom, and therein to breed
At last an issue foul of fell revenge;
In purpose fell, though in fulfilment foiled.
But Saul, magnanimously heedless, deigned
Nor glance at him nor thought of consequence.
Elate with the elixir of his youth,
And buoyed with confidence exultant now
By the rebound of his beginning, buoyed
Besides with sympathy, he passed along,
Yet, master he, not mastered, of his mood,
Curbed strongly his strong passion and delight
Of power, and, calm with self-possessing will,
Force in him to have sped a thunderbolt
Stayed back from sudden waste, to be sent on
In fine diffusive throb—as farther thus:
"Enough of that; I did but purify
My soul with words. I feared some inward stain
From only listening, if I listened only,
And did not speak, when base was proffered me.
"Hear now what I propose. What I propose
Is not advice; advice I neither give
Nor ask. I do not ask it, for my heart
Is fixed; duress of conscience presses me,
With flesh and blood forbidding to confer.
I must do what I shall, in man's or devil's
Despite. I trust I speak not thus in pride.
Not therefore that the census of your yeas
Or nays may guide me, but that ye may weigh
What force my purpose now unfolded owns
To sway your present counsels, hear and judge.
"Ye know, and all Jerusalem, that Saul
Has counted nothing worthy to be prized
Beside the learning of the law of God.
For this, a boy, from yon Cilician lands
I came; for this, I have consumed my youth.
What envied gains of knowledge I have made,
Sitting a student at Gamaliel's feet,
Befits me not to vaunt; these, small or large,
Belong to God and to my nation, being mine
Only to use for Him and them. I see
Plainly how I must use my trust from God.
Wherefore are we assembled? Wherefore, save
Because these sciolists pervert the law,
Deceived perhaps, deceiving certainly?"
Scarce waved a careless hand in sign at them—
Toward the apostles, still in presence there,
Saul deigned not to divert his scornful eyes:
"Shame is it if I, knowing the law indeed,
Am less than match for these untutored minds,
Amid the flocking fools they lead astray,
To controvert their hateful heresies.
Herewith then I proclaim my ripe resolve
To undertake, against the preaching liars,
On their own terms, a warfare for the truth.
Let it be seen which cause, in open list,
Is stronger, truth from heaven or lie from hell!
"Brethren and fathers, as ye will, consult;
The youngest has his purpose thus divulged."
As when a palm diversely blown upon
In a strong tempest of opponent winds,
Now this way, and now that, obedient
To each prevailing present urgency,
Leans to all quarters of the firmament
By turns, but quickly, let a lull succeed,
Upright again, shows every leaf composed;
So now the council, long enough between
Opinion and opinion buffeted,
While Saul was speaking took a little ease,
No new advice proposed, to breathe again,
Steady itself, and come to equipoise.
Some thought that Saul had spoken proudly; some,
That pride became his worth; some held that he
Would make his vaunting good; some feared his plan
Savored of youth and rashness; others deemed
Public dispute mistaken precedent
Teeming with various mischief—sure to breed
Insufferable pretensions in the crowd,
So taught to count themselves fit arbiters
On Scriptural or traditional points of moot,
And, by close consequence, a serious breach
Endanger in their own authority;
Yet others felt, whatever fruit beside
Was borne of Saul's proposed experiment,
Two things at least were safe to reckon on—
In its own dignity, the Sanhedrim
Must needs incur immedicable hurt,
So plainly scandalous a spectacle
Exhibiting, a councillor enrolled
Of their own number stooping to debate
On equal terms with ignorant fishermen;
Then, on their side, those flattered fishermen,
Far from indulging proper gratitude
For being publicly confounded quite
At such illustrious hands, would be instead
Inflated out of measure, nigh to burst,
With added pride at complaisance so new
From their superiors, while the common herd
Would give them greater heed accordingly.
Such things diverse they thought, and silence kept,
Saul's colleagues in the Sanhedrim; they all
Together felt that Saul in any wise
Would go Saul's way; they therefore silence kept.
One man alone, by age and gravity,
And reverence his in ample revenue,
Was easy master of the Sanhedrim:
On him the council rested and revolved,
As on a fixéd centre and support.
And now 'Gamaliel! let us hear at last
Gamaliel's word' was suddenly the sole,
The simultaneous, silent thought to all.
The eyes of all concentred instantly
Upon Gamaliel found that saint esteemed
And sage already stirring as to rise.
Their readiness to hear, with his to speak,
Timed so in perfect reciprocity
And exquisite accord responsive, marked
That fleet meet moment for the orator,
Which, conscious half, but half unconscious, he,
Gamaliel, wielded by the Holy Ghost,
Was now to seize and use for God so well.
The hoary head, the mien of majesty,
The associative power of ancient fame,
His habit and tradition of command,
Their instinct, grown inveterate, to obey,
Always, wherever he arose to speak
Among his brethren, won Gamaliel heed.
But now, a certain gentle winsomeness,
Born of a certain wavering wistfulness,
Qualified so a new solemnity
Of manner, like a prophet's, felt in him,
That awe came on his hearers as from God.
Gamaliel first bade put the prisoners forth,
In keeping, out of audience, and then said:
"My brethren: Saul my brother—son no more
I name him, since he parts himself from me
In counsel—yet I love him not the less—"
A tremor of sensation fluttered through
The council, with these words, and at Saul's heart
Pausing, infixed, then healed, a subtle pang
Of sweet remorse and gracious tenderness—
"Yea, not the less for this love I my son,
My brother, while I honor him the more.
Yea, and not wholly does he part himself
From me; in deepest counsel we are one.
Saul seeks to honor God obeying Him,
The same seek I; are we not deeply one?
And ever I have taught obedience
To God as the prime thing and paramount;
Disciple therefore still to me, and son,
Is Saul, even in this act and article
Of his secession from his master's part;
Saul and Gamaliel both, and all of us,
I pray my God to save from self-deceit!
I shudder while I pray, 'Deliver me,
O Lord, deliver, from the secret sin
Of false supposed obedience masking pride!'
"Late, I was sure, as Saul is sure to-day.
I thought, and doubted not, we ought to do
Even what ye now are bent to bring to pass.
My way was not Saul's way, but rather yours;
To me it seemed plainly, as seems to you,
Wiser to save the body by some loss,
If loss were need, of limb. Unfalteringly,
The knife would I myself with mine own hand
Have wielded to cut off these members, judged
Unsound and harmful to the general health,
Forever from the congregation. Now,
I feel less sure, Gamaliel feels less sure.
I wish—brethren, I think I wish—to be
Obedient; though deceitful is the heart
Above all things and wicked desperately—
What man can know it?—yet I think I will
Obedience. That was a pure word—the mouth
However far from pure that uttered it—
'To God rather than men must we obey.'
Saul was true son of mine to turn from me
To God—if haply he to God indeed
Have turned from me, and not from me to Saul,
Not knowing! Might I also turn, even I,
Gamaliel from Gamaliel, unto God!
I dread to trust myself, lest I, myself
Obeying, misdeem myself obeying God.
"Hearken, my children. These accuséd men
Unlikely, most unlikely, choice of Heaven
To be His prophets, seemed, and seem, to me.
I look at them and find no prophet mien;
I listen and their Galilæan speech
Offends me; and far more the scandal is
To think what message they propound to us.
Their person and their message I reject—
Reject, or if reject not, not receive.
And yet, my brethren, yet, I counsel you,
Beware! What ye intend, accomplished once,
Were once for all accomplished, not to be
Undone forever. Ye consult to slay,
And find your purpose hard to come by. How,
If, having slain, to your repentance, ye
Consulted to bring back to life again?
Were that not harder yet? Wherefore take heed,
Ye men of Israel. Remember how,
A generation gone, Theudas arose,
Proud boaster and asserter of himself,
Who drew his hundreds to his standard; he
Was slain, and all his followers came to naught.
Some space thereafter, out of Galilee
Judas arose and mustered to his side
Many adherents; but he perished too,
And all that clave to him were far dispersed.
"This therefore as to these is my advice:
Refrain your hands from them; let them alone.
Know, if their deed and counsel be of men,
Its doom is certain, it will come to naught;
But if it be of God, strive how ye may,
Ye cannot overthrow it. Well take heed,
Lest haply ye be found to fight against
God. For myself, when close upon the heels
Of what was wrought mysterious in the escape
Of these our prisoners from that warded keep
Fast-barred, I heard their answer to our sharp
Inquest and blame, I felt as felt of old
That prophet chanting his majestic strain,
'The Lord is in His holy temple, let
The earth, let the whole earth, before Him keep
Silence.' My soul kept silence and still keeps.
And silence keep, all ye, before the Lord!
For the Lord cometh, lo, He cometh swift
To judge the earth! And who of us shall bide
The day of His approach? Not surely he
Then found in arms against God and His Christ!"
Gamaliel spoke and ceased; but, while he spoke,
His speaking was like silence audible,
Rather than sound of voice; and when he ceased,
His silence was as eloquence prolonged.
Awhile the council sat as in a trance,
Unable or unwilling to bestir
Themselves for speech or motion. But not all
Are capable of awe. Some present there,
Either through sad defect of nature proof,
Or through long worldly habit seared and sealed,
Against the access of heavenly influence,
Bode unaware of anything divine
Descended near them—carnal minds, immersed
In sense, from shocks of spirit insulate,
Calm, discomposure none from things unseen,
The faculty for such experience lost,
Pitiably self-possessed! and God Himself
So nigh to have possessed them!
These a space
Waited to let the power a little pass,
Wrought by Gamaliel on the council; then
With tentative preamble, one of them
Said that Gamaliel's words were words of weight,
Weight well derived from character like his—
Whereat the speaker paused, with crafty eye
Cast round from countenance to countenance,
To read how much he safely might detract,
By open difference or by sly demur,
From the just value and authority
Of mild Gamaliel's sentence. But small sign
Saw he to hearten him in hope of ebb
To the strong tide still standing at full flood
That set in favor of the prisoners.
He feebly closed with wish expressed—and wish
It was, not hope—of hope no grounds he saw—
That some means might be found to save the shocked
And staggering dignity—a dignity
Ancient and sacred—of the Sanhedrim
From sheer shipwreck.
Some slight responsive stir
Under such spur to pride emboldened one
To trust they should at least sharply rebuke
The prisoners, and take bond of word from them
Not further to disturb the city's peace.
Another following said, that had been tried
Already once, with what result accrued
Was plain to see. And now the Sanhedrim,
Through various such suggestion commonplace,
Relaxed somewhat from their late mood so tense,
Grew readier to approve his voice who said:
"The first offence we deemed condignly met
With reprimand from us, and interdict.
Those gentle means the prisoners once have scorned,
And to our face assure us they will scorn.
Now let such contumacious insolence
Toward just authority too meek, be met,
If not with death deserved, at least with stripes
So heavy they shall wish it had been death."
Such truculence renewed provoked a new
Reaction. This, that councillor less stern
Noted—who, with Gamaliel and with Saul,
Refrained, when all the others hissed applause
To Mattathias—noted, and with thrift
Converted into opportunity.
A wary spirit Nicodemus was,
With impulses toward good, but weak in will,
And selfish as the timid are. His heart
Was a divided empire in his breast,
Half firm for God, but half to self seduced.
His fellows trusted him accordingly;
Hate him they could not, but they did not love.
Some guessed him guilty of discipleship
To Jesus, secretly indulged through fear.
This their suspicion the suspect in turn
Suspected, and the uneasy consciousness
Made him more curious than his wont to move
By indirection toward his present aim.
What he wished was, to serve the prisoners
And not disserve himself—a double end,
Rendering his counsels double; but as such
Could speak, now Nicodemus rising spoke.
With sinuous slow approach winning his way
Devious whither he wished to go, like those
Creatures that backward facing forward creep
And seem retiring still while they advance,
So Nicodemus wound him toward his goal,
Well-chosen, as he said:
"Let us be wise;
Beyond our purpose were not well to go,
Were foolish. Cruelty is not, I trust,
Our spirit; God is just, but cruel not.
Let us, God's sons, be just indeed, like God,
But then, like God, also not cruel. Stripes
Are heavy, howsoever lightly laid
On freeborn men. The shame is punishment;
A wounded spirit who can bear? Through flesh
You smite the smarting spirit, every blow.
Remember too that lacerated flesh
Has lips to plead with, makes its mute appeal
To pity—eloquence incapable
Of being answered, charging cruelty;
Whereas the bleeding spirit, bleeding hid,
No cruelty imputes, reports no pain,
But, pith of self-respect clean gone from one,
Glazes the eye, dejects the countenance,
Changes the voice to hollow, takes the spring
Out of the step, and leaves the man a wretch
To suffer on an object of contempt
More than compassion—hopelessly bereft
Of power to captivate the public ear,
Which ever itches to be caught the prey
Of orator full-blooded, iron lungs,
Brass front, a lusty human animal.
Such make of men, through shame of public stripes,
Transformed to eunuchs—this, sure, were enough;
Nay, for our purpose, more than more would be.
And even so much as this, yea, lightest stripe,
Drawing a sequel such as I have said—
Brethren, for me, my soul revolts from it;
I feel it cruel, fear it impious.
Behooves we ponder well Gamaliel's word;
And, if to slay were haply against God
To be found fighting, why not, then, to scourge?"
"Such fine-spun sentiment," another now,
Concurring, though sarcastically, said,
"In pity of the victim of the scourge
For suffering inwardly endured through shame,
Supposes that your victim is endowed
With some small faculty for feeling shame,
Which in the present case asks evidence.
"Still, I too take the clement part, and say,
If only for Saul's sake, let these go free
Of any but the lightest punishment.
Saul will desire for foemen hearts as strong
As may be, to call out that strength in him
Which we well know, for their discomfiture.
Even thus, he may prefer some other foe
Than men disparaged by the brand of blows
Upon their backs, some fairer, fresher fame,
His gage of battle to take up, and be
By him immortalized through overthrow
Experienced, such as never yet was worse."
Divergent so in view or motive, they
Agreed at last to let the prisoners go
With stripes inflicted, and a charge severe
Imposed to speak in Jesus' name no more.
These so released departed thence with joy,
Rejoicing to have been accounted meet
For Jesus' sake to suffer shame. Nor ceased
Those faithful men to preach and teach as erst,
Both in the temple and from house to house,
Daily still sounding forth Jesus as Christ.
But Saul withdrew deep pondering in his mind
How he might best his plan divulged fulfill.
BOOK III.
SAUL AGAINST STEPHEN.
Stephen, as a Christian preacher of brilliant genius and of
growing fame, is selected by Saul to be his antagonist in the
controversy resolved upon by him. To a vast concourse of
people assembled in expectation of hearing Stephen preach,
Saul takes the opportunity to address an impassioned and
elaborate appeal, with argument, against Stephen's doctrine.
His hearers are powerfully affected; among them, he not
knowing it, Saul's own beloved sister Rachel.
SAUL AGAINST STEPHEN.
Like a wise soldier on some task intent
Of moment and of hazard, who, at heart
Secure of prospering, yet no caution counts,
No pains, unworthy, but with wary feet
Explores his ground about him every rood,
All elements of chance forecalculates,
Draws to his part each doubtful circumstance;
Never too much provided, point by point
Equips himself superfluously strong,
That he prevailing may with might prevail,
And overcome with bounteous victory;
So Saul, firm in resolve and confident,
And inly stung with conscience and with zeal
Not to postpone his weighty work proposed,
Would not be hasty found, nor rash, to fail
Of any circumspection that his sure
Triumph might make more sure, or wider stretch
Its margin, certain to be wide.
Some days
After the council, he, with forecast sage
And prudence to prepare, refrained himself
From word or deed in public; while, at home,
Not moody, but not genial as his use,
His gracious use, was, self-absorbed, retired
In deep and absent muse, he nigh might seem
A stranger to his sister well-beloved,
Wont to be sharer of his inmost mind.
Inmost, save one reserve. He never yet
Had shown to any, scarce himself had seen,
The true deep master motive of his soul,
That fountain darkling in the depths of self
Whence into light all streams of being flowed.
Saul daily, nightly, waking, sleeping, dreamed
Of a new nation, his belovéd own,
Resurgent from the dust consummate fair,
And, for chief corner-stone, with shoutings reared
To station in the stately edifice—
Whom but himself? Who worthier than Saul?
This beckoning image bright of things to be—
Audacious-lovelier far than might be shown
To any, yea, than he himself dared look,
With his own eyes, steadfast and frank upon—
Was interblent so closely in his mind
With what should be the fortune and effect
Of his intended controversy nigh,
That, though his settled purpose to dispute
He had for public reasons publicly
Declared, he yet in private, of that strife,
Still future, everywhere to speak abstained,
Abiding even unto his sister dumb.
Rachel from Tarsus to Jerusalem
Had borne her brother company, her heart
One heart with his to cheer him toward the goal
Of his high purpose, which she knew, to be
Beyond his equals master in the law.
Alone they dwelt together, their abode
Between Gamaliel's and the synagogue
Of the Cilicians. Beautiful and bright
His home she made to him, with housewife ways
Neat-handed, and with fair companionship.
The sister, with that quick intelligence
The woman's, first divined, for secret cause
Of this her brother's travailing silentness,
That he some pregnant enterprise revolved;
Then, having, with the woman's wit, found means
To advise herself what enterprise it was,
She, with the woman's tact of sympathy,
In watchful quiet reverent of his mood,
Strove with him and strove for him, in her thought,
Her wish, her hope, her prayer; nor failed sometimes
A word to drop, unconsciously as seemed,
By lucky chance, that might perhaps convey
A timely help of apt suggestion wise
To Saul her brother for his purpose, he
All undisturbed to guess that aught was meant.
At home, abroad, reserved, Saul not the less
All places of men's frequence and resort
Still visited, and mixed with crowds to catch
The whisper of the people; active not,
But not supine, observing unobserved
As if alone amid the multitude.
The brave apostles of the Nazarene
He heard proclaim their master Lord and Christ,
And marked their method in the Scriptures; not
With open mind obedient toward the truth,
But ever only with shut heart and hard,
Intent on knowing how to contradict.
Meanwhile the novel doctrines spread, and found
New converts day by day, and day by day
Proclaimers new. Of these more eminent
Was none than Stephen, flaming prophet he,
Quenchless in spirit, full of faith and power.
Him oft Saul heard, to listening throngs that hung
Upon the herald's lips with eager ear,
The claim of Jesus to Messiahship
Assert, and from the psalms and prophets prove.
In guise a seraph rapt, with love aflame
And all aflame with knowledge, like the bush
That burned with God in Horeb unconsumed,
The fervent pure apostle Stephen stood,
In ardors from celestial altars caught
Kindling to incandescence—stood and forged,
With ringing blow on blow, his argument,
A vivid weapon edged and tempered so,
And in those hands so wielded, that its stroke
No mortal might abide and bide upright.
Stephen is such as Saul erelong will be
Risen from the baptism of the Holy Ghost!
Saul felt the breath of human power that blew
Round Stephen like a morning wind, he felt
The light that lifted and transfigured him
And glorified, that bright auroral ray
Of genius which forever makes the brow
It strikes on from its fountain far in God
Shine like the sunrise-smitten mountain peak—
Saul felt these things in Stephen by his tie
With Stephen in the fellowship of power;
Kindred to kindred answered and rejoiced.
But that in Stephen which was more and higher
Than Stephen at his native most and highest,
The inhabitation of the Holy Ghost—
This, Saul had yet no sense to apprehend.
The Spirit of God, only the Spirit of God
Can know; the natural man to Him is deaf
And blind. Saul, therefore, seeing did not see,
And hearing heard not. But no less his heart,
In seeing and in hearing Stephen speak,
Leapt up with recognition of a peer
In power to be his meet antagonist
And task him to his uttermost to foil.
Beyond Saul's uttermost it was to be,
That task! though this of Stephen not, but God.
Still goaded day by day with such desire
As nobler spirits know, to feel the strain
And wrestle of antagonistic thews
Tempting his might and stirring up his mind,
Saul felt, besides, the motion and ferment
And great dilation of a patriot soul,
Magnanimous, laboring for his country's cause.
He thought the doctrines of the Nazarene
Pernicious to the Jewish commonwealth,
Not less than was his person base, his life
Unseemly, and opprobrious his death.
He saw, or deemed he saw, in what was taught
From Jesus, only deep disparagement
Disloyally implied of everything
Nearest and dearest to the Hebrew heart.
The gospel was high treason in Saul's eyes;
Suppose it but established in success,
The temple then would be no more what erst
It was, the daily sacrifice would cease,
The holy places would with heathen feet
Be trodden and profaned, the middle wall
Of old partition between Jew and Greek
Would topple undermined, the ritual law
Of Moses would be obsolete and void,
Common would be the oracles of God,
To all divulged, peculiar once to Jews—
Of Jewish name and nation what were left?
Such thoughts, that seemed of liberal scope, were Saul's,
Commingled, he not knowing, with some thoughts,
Less noble, of his own aggrandizement.
It came at length to pass that on a day
The spacious temple-court is thronged with those
Come from all quarters to Jerusalem,
Or dwellers of the city, fain to hear
Once more the preacher suddenly so famed.
Present is Saul, but not as heretofore
To hearken only and observe; the hour
Has struck when his own voice he must uplift,
To make it heard abroad.
He dreamed it not,
But Rachel too was there, his sister. She
Had, from sure signs observed, aright surmised
That the ripe time to speak was come to Saul.
In her glad loyalty, she doubted not
That he, that day, would, out of a full mind,
Pressed overfull with affluence from the heart,
Pour forth a stream of generous eloquence—
Stream, nay, slope torrent, steep sheer cataract,
Of reason and of passion intermixed—
For such she proudly felt her brother's power—
Which down should rush upon his adversaries
And carry them away as with a flood,
Astonished, overwhelmed, and whirled afar;
Rescued at least the ruins of the state!
So glorying in her high vicarious hope
For Saul her brother, Rachel came that morn
Betimes and chose her out a safe recess
For easy audience, nigh, and yet retired,
Between the pillars of a stately porch,
Where she might see and not by him be seen.
Thence Rachel watched all eagerly; when now
The multitude, expecting Stephen, saw
A different man stand forth with beckoning hand
As if to speak. The act and attitude
Commanded audience, for a king of men
Stood there, and a great silence fell on all.
Some knew the face of the young Pharisee,
These whispered round his name; Saul's name and fame
To all were known, and, ere the speaker spoke,
Won him a deepening heed.
Rachel the hush
Felt with a secret sympathetic awe,
And for one breath her beating heart stood still;
It leapt again to hear her brother's voice
Pealing out bold in joyous sense of power.
That noble voice, redounding like a surge
Pushed by the tide, on swept before the wind,
And all the ocean shouldering at its back,
Which seeks out every inlet of the shore
To brim it flush and level from the brine—
Such Saul's voice swelled, as from a plenteous sea,
And, wave on wave of pure elastic tone,
Rejoicing ran through every gallery,
And every echoing endless colonnade,
And every far-retreating least recess
Of building round about that temple-court,
And filled the temple-court with silver sound—
As thus, with haughty summons, he began:
"Ye men of Israel, sojourners from far
Or dwellers in Jerusalem, give heed.
The lines are fallen to us in evil times:
Opinions run abroad perverse and strange,
Divergent from the faith our fathers held.
A day is come, brethren, and fallen on us—
On us, this living generation, big
With promise, or with threat, of mighty doom.
Which will ye have it? Threat, or promise, which?
Yours is the choosing—choose ye may, ye must.
"Abolish Moses, if ye will; destroy
The great traditions of your fathers; say
Abraham was naught, naught Isaac, Jacob, all
The patriarchs, heroes, martyrs, prophets, kings;
That Seed of Abraham naught, our nation's Hope,
Foretold to be an universal King;
Make one wide blank and void, an emptied page,
Of all the awful glories of our past—
Deliverance out of Egypt, miracle
On miracle wrought dreadfully for us
Against our foes, path cloven through the sea,
Jehovah in the pillar of cloud and fire,
And host of Pharaoh mightily overthrown;
The law proclaimed on Sinai amid sound
And light insufferable and angels nigh
Attending; manna in the wilderness;
The rock that lived and moved and followed them,
Our fathers, flowing water in the waste—
Obliterate at a stroke whatever sets
The seal of God upon you as His own,
And marks you different from the heathen round—
Shekinah fixed between the cherubim,
The vacant Holy of Holies filled with God,
The morning and the evening sacrifice,
Priest, altar, incense, choral hymn and psalm,
Confused melodious noise of instruments
Together sounding the high praise of God;
All this, with more I will not stay to tell,
This temple itself with its magnificence,
The hope of Him foreshown, the Messenger
Of that eternal covenant wherein
Your souls delight themselves, Who suddenly
One day shall come unto His temple—blot,
Expunge, erase, efface, consent to be
No more a people, mix and merge yourselves
With aliens, blood that in your veins flows pure
All the long way one stream continuous down
From Abraham called the friend of God—such blood
Adulterate in the idolatrous, corrupt
Pool of the Gentiles—men of Israel!
Or are ye men? and are ye Israel?
I stand in doubt of you—I stand in doubt
Of kinsmen mine supposed that bide to hear
Such things as seems that ye with pleasure hear!
"Say, know ye not they mean to take away
Your place and name? Are ye so blind? Or are
Ye only base poor creatures caring not
Though knowing well? Oft have ye seen the fat
Of lambs upon the flaming altar fume
One instant and in fume consume away;
So swiftly and so utterly shall pass,
In vapor of smoke, the glorious excellency,
The pomp, the pride, nay, but the being itself,
Of this our nation from beneath the sun,
Let once the hideous doctrine of a Christ
Condemned and crucified usurp the place
In Hebrew hearts of that undying hope
We cherish of Messiah yet to reign
In power and glory more than Solomon's,
From sunrise round to sunrise without end,
And tread the Gentiles underneath our feet."
Indignant patriot spirit in the breast
Of Rachel mixed itself with kindred pride
And gladness for her brother gleaming so
Before her in a kind of fulgurous scorn
Which made his hearers quail while they admired;
She could not stay a sudden gush of tears.
But Saul's voice now took on a winning change,
As, deprecating gently, thus he spoke:
"Forgive, my brethren, I have used hot words
Freely and frankly, as great love may speak.
But that I love you, trust you, hope of you
The best, the noblest, when once more you are
Yourselves, and feel the spirit of your past
Come back, I had not cared to speak at all.
I simply should have hung my head in shame,
Worn sackcloth, gone with ashes on my brow,
And sealed my hand upon my lips for you
Forever. Love does not despair, but hopes
Forever. And I love you far too well
To dream despair of you. Bethink yourselves,
My brethren! Me, as if I were the voice
Of your own ancient aspiration, hear.
Bear with me, let me chide, say not that love
Lured me to over-confidence of you.
"Be patient now, my brethren, while I go,
So briefly as I may, through argument
That well might ask the leisure of long hours,
To show from Scripture, from authority,
From reason and from nature too not less,
Why we should hold to our ancestral faith,
And not the low fanatic creed admit
Of such as preach for Christ one crucified.
Be patient—I myself must patient be,
Tutoring down my heart to let my tongue
Speak calmly, as in doubtful argument,
Where I am fixed and confident to scorn."
As when Gennesaret, in his circling hills,
By wing of wind down swooping suddenly
Is into tempest wrought that, to his depths
Astir, he rouses, and on high his waves
Uplifts like mountains snowy-capped with foam;
So, smitten with the vehement impact
And passion of Saul's rash, abrupt
Beginning, that mercurial multitude
Had answered with commotion such as seemed
Menace of instant act of violence:
But, as when haply there succeeds a lull
To tempest, then the waves of Galilee
Sink from their swelling and smooth down to plane
Yet deep will roll awhile from shore to shore
That long slow undulation following storm;
So, when, with wise self-recollection, Saul,
In mid-career of passionate appeal,
Stayed, and those gusts of stormy eloquence
Impetuous poured no longer on the sea
Of audience underneath him, but, instead,
Proposed a sober task of argument,
The surging throng surceased its turbulence,
And settled from commotion into calm;
Yet so as still to feel the rock and sway
Of central agitation at its heart,
While thus that master of its moods went on:
"What said Jehovah to the serpent vile
Which tempted Eve? Did he not speak of One,
Offspring to her seduced, Who should arise
To crush the offending head? No hint, I trow,
Of meekness and obedience unto death
Found there at least, death on the shameful tree,
Forsooth, to be the character and doom
Of that foretokened Champion of his kind,
That haughty Trampler upon Satan's head!
"To Abraham our father was of God
Foretold, 'In thee shall all the families
Of the earth be blessed.' What blessing, pray, could come
Abroad upon mankind through Abraham's seed,
Messiah, should Messiah, Abraham's seed,
Prove to be such as now is preached to you,
A shame, a jest, a byword, a reproach,
A hissing and a wagging of the head,
A gazing-stock and mark for tongues shot out—
Burlesque and travesty of our brave hopes
And of our vaunts, shown vain, rife everywhere
Among the nations, that erelong a prince
Should from the stem of Jesse spring, to sway
An universal sceptre through the world?
"Did God mock Abraham? Did He mean, perchance,
That all the families of the earth should find
Peculiar blessedness in triumphing
Over that puissant nation promised him,
His progeny, to match the stars of heaven
For multitude, and be as on the shore
The sands, innumerable? Was such the sense
Of promise and of prophecy? Behooves,
Then, we be glad and thankful, we, on whom
The fullness of the time now falls, to be
This blessing to the Gentiles. But ye halt,
Beloved. Slack and slow seem ye to greet
The honor fixed on you. Why, hearken! Ye,
Ye, out of all the generations, ye
Fallen on the times of Jesus crucified,
May count yourselves elect and called of God
To bless the Gentiles, in affording them
Unquenchable amusement to behold
Your wretched plight and broken pride! Now clap
Your hands, ye chosen! Let your mouth be filled
With laughter, and your tongue with singing filled!
"Nay, sons of Abraham, nay. No mocking words
Spake He who cannot lie, Lord God of truth
And grace. He meant that Abraham's race should reign
From sea to sea while sun and moon endure.
And ever a blessing true it is to men
To bend the neck beneath an equal yoke
Of ruler strong and wise and just to rule.
Then will at last the Gentiles blesséd be
In Abraham, when, from Abraham's loins derived
Through David, God's Anointed shall begin,
In David's city, His long government
Of the wide world, and every heathen name
Shall kiss the rod and own Messiah king.
"Our father Jacob, touched with prophecy,
Spake of a sceptre that should not depart
From Judah until Shiloh came, to Whom
The obedience of the peoples was to be;
A sceptre, symbol of authority
And rule, law-giving attribute, resort
Of subject nations speeding to a yoke—
Such ever everywhere in Holy Writ
The image and the character impressed
On God's Messiah, hope of Israel.
"What need I more? Wherefore to ears like yours,
Well used to hear them in the temple chants
Resounded with responsive voice to voice,
Rehearse those triumphs and antiphonies
Wherein Jehovah Father to His Son
Messiah speaks: 'Ask Thou of Me, and I
To Thee the heathen for inheritance
Will give, and for possession the extreme
Parts of the earth. Thou shalt with rod of iron
Break them, yea, shatter them shalt Thou in shards,
Like a clay vessel from the potters hand.
Be wise now, therefore, O ye kings, be ye
Instructed, judges of the earth. Kiss ye
The Son, lest He be angry, and His wrath,
Full soon to be enkindled, you devour.'
Tell me, which mood of prophecy is that,
The meek or the heroic? Craven he,
Or king, to whom Jehovah deigns such speech,
Concerning whom such counsel recommends?
"'Gird Thou upon Thy thigh Thy sword, O Thou
Most Mighty,'—so once more the psalmist, rapt
Prophetical as to a martial rage,
Breaks forth, Jehovah to Messiah speaking—
'Gird on Thy glory and Thy majesty;
And in Thy majesty ride prosperously,
And Thy right hand shall teach Thee terrible things.
Sharp in the heart of the king's enemies
Thine arrows are, whereby the peoples fall
Beneath Thee.' Such Messiah is, a man
Of war and captain of the host of God.
Nay, now it mounts to a deific strain,
The prophet exultation of the psalm:
'Thy throne, O God' it sings—advancing Him,
Messiah, to the unequalled dignity
And lonely glory of the ONE I AM,
Audacious figure—close on blasphemy,
Were it not God who speaks—to represent
The dazzling splendors of Messiahship.
"Let us erect our spirits from the dust,
My brethren, and, as sons of God, nay, gods
Pronounced—unless we grovel and below
Our birthright due, unfilial and unfit,
Sink self-depressed—let us, I pray you, rise,
Buoyed upward from within by sense of worth
Incapable to be extinguished, rise,
Found equal to the will of God for us,
And know the true Messiah when He comes.
Be sure that when He comes, His high degree
Will shine illustrious, like the sun in heaven,
Not feebly flicker for your fishermen
From Galilee to point it out to you
With their illiterate 'Lo, here!' 'Lo, there!'"
At this increasing burst of scorn from Saul,
Exultant like the pæan and the cry
That rises through the palpitating air
When storming warriors take the citadel,
Once more from Rachel's fixéd eyes the tears
Of sympathetic exultation flowed—
The sister with the brother, as in strife
Before the battle striving equally,
Now equally in triumph triumphing.
But Saul, his triumph, felt to be secure,
Securer still will make with new appeal:
"If so, as we have seen, the Scriptures trend,
Not less the current of tradition too—
No counter-current, eddy none—one stress,
Steady and full, from Adam down to you,
Runs strong the self-same way. Out of the past
What voice is heard in contradiction? None.
"Turn round and ask the present; you shall hear
One answer still the same from every mouth
Of scribe or master versed in Holy Writ.
Tradition and authority in this
Agree with Scripture, teaching to await
For our deliverer an anointed king.
What ruler of our people has believed
In Jesus, him of Nazareth, Joseph's son,
As Christ of God? If any, then some soul
Self-judged unworthy of his rulership,
Secret disciple, shunning to avow
His faith, and justly therefore counted naught—
Ruler in name, in nature rather slave.
"And now I bid you look within your breast
And answer, Does not your own heart rebel
Against the gospel of the Nazarene?
'Gospel,' forsooth! Has God, who made your heart,
Provided you for gospel what your heart
Rejects with loathing? Likely seems it, pray,
Becoming, fit, that He Who, on the mount
Of Sinai once the law promulging, there
Displayed His glory more than mortal eye
Could bear to look upon or ear to hear—
Who in the temple hid behind the veil
Shekinah blazed between the cherubim—
Nay, tell me, seems it tolerable even
To you, that your Jehovah God should choose,
Lover of splendor as He is, and power,
To represent Himself among mankind
Not merely naked of magnificence,
But outright squalid in the mean estate
And person of a carpenter, to die
At last apparent felon crucified?
Reason and nature outraged cry aloud,
'For shame! For shame!' at blasphemy like this."
A strange ungentle impulse moved the heart
Of Rachel to a mood like mutiny,
And almost she "For shame!" herself cried out
In echo to her brother's vehemence;
While murmur as of wind rousing to storm
Ran through the assembly at such words from Saul,
The passion of the speaker so prevailed
To stir responsive passion in their breasts.
This Saul perceiving said, in scornful pride,
Fallaciously foretasting triumph won:
"Ye men of Israel, gladly I perceive
Some embers of the ancient fire remain,
If smouldering, not extinguished, in your breasts.
I will not further chafe your noble rage.
You are, if I mistake not, now prepared
To hear more safely, if less patiently,
The eloquence I keep you from too long.
Let me bespeak for Stephen your best heed."
And Saul, as if in gesture of surcease,
A pace retiring, waved around his hand
Toward Stephen, opposite not far, the while
His nostril he dispread, and mobile lip
Curled, in the height of contumelious scorn;
And Rachel, where she stood, unconsciously,
The transport of her sympathy was such,
Repeated with her features what she saw.